As someone who converted away from Jodoshinshu Buddhism, I can say that I used to believe everything you said above, because I heard it all too. However, I encourage you to read Professor Ford’s book, and study Jokei’s refutation of the “exclusive-Nembutsu” practice. Ford’s argument is right: many of the explanations have remained unchallenged in Japanese religious history for too long, and get passed on to lay followers who don’t know better.

For many people, Buddhism is a way to pray for good things in life, but that is a problem of the individual or popular-culture, not the religion. People pray for selfish things in every religion. It doesn’t justify Jodoshinshu’s uniqueness compared to other sects, and its exclusiveness, like the exclusiveness sometimes found in Zen, is in my opinion more of a hindrance than help. If you don’t believe me, study the Buddha’s own teachings, for example the last half of the Immeasurable Life Sutra (a Pure Land text), the Pali Canon, etc, and see that he advocated a well-rounded approach to the Buddhist path, not an exclusive one.

Likewise, with the notion of Dharma-decline, this is more of a cultural phenomenon than a doctrinal one. Medieval Buddhists in Japan had calculated the birth of the Buddha too far back and assumed they were already living in the days of Dharma Decline, but this is very subjective. If you look at noble teachers today, the Dharma has declined no less than it did 800 years ago.

Also, regarding such things as superstition in Asian religion, Professor Yao has good thoughts with regard to what comprises religion in Chinese, as I quoted in this later post.

Again, I already left the Jodoshinshu sect months ago and have no desire to return, nor endorse it in this blog either.

I can understand the feelings expressed by Dough over the exclusiveness of jodoshinshu and jodoshu teachings.

Yes, some new to japanese pureland schools can find certain aspects dogmatic and inflexible.

As a Jodoshinshu buddhist from a Chinese and tibetan buddhist background, what I can say are as follows

1) The exclusiveness of jodoshinshu and honen stems mainly out of a desire to teach something simple and yet most effective for the masses who were illiterate, poor and unable to devote time for traditional practices. Furthermore, many were engaged in occupations that were seen as non-buddhist (fishing, farming, hunting, professional soliders etc). This meant that such people were excluded from traditional practices.

2) The idea that certain practices are superior over others is common in traditional buddhist teachings of many schools. For example, Kukai uses doctrinal text to propose that the shingon teachings are superior over other schools. The same goes for tendai, kegon and other schools.
The idea of the Dharma ending age rendering certain practices less effective or not relevant is also common in many buddhist schools as well.
In this sense, Shinran and Honen are not writing works that are totally radical in those days.

3) The elitist aspect of older schools is a common trait even up to meiji era. Most of the scholar monks were from distinguished backgrounds. This was the general trend even in other buddhist countries such as Tibet.

4) The reason why shinshu revers Amida exclusively is because sentient beings tend to be unfocused and the folk religions often revere the many bodhisattvas with a motive for worldly benefits (good harvest, timely rain etc). While there is nothing inherently wrong with prayers for worldly benefits, from the buddhist perspective, it deters people from understanding buddhist doctrines and sometimes encourages folk and superstitious practices.

Before I converted to shinshu, I used to petition the various buddhas, bodhisattvas for all kinds of needs. Eg, Medicine buddha for healing from sickness etc. It was not satisfying as one’s faith became based on not whether we revere the buddha for his wisdom but rather for his ability to give benefits. There are also more and more chinese pureland temples who also decided to stick exclusively to Amitabha practice and remove many unrelated liturgy and practices.

Amida shares a common dharmakaya body with all other buddhas. Thus revering him alone is in no way neglecting any other buddhas or bodhisattvas. This can be attested by the Amida sutra whereby the buddhas of 6 directions praise shakyamuni and Amida buddha.

5) At the end of the day, it is up to individual to decide if Jodoshinshu teachings suit him/her. (refer to tannisho) However, after trying out many different doctrines, I think I still enjoy the simplicity of Jodoshinshu.

I hope this helps

Each too well greased machine needs a gritty sand corn,
I feel myself in the “non tradition” of the old Tao freaks or guys like:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ikky%C5%AB

What a sleepy, sleepy world!

“Just follow which aspect you tend to have a karmic connection toward, whether it be Amitabha Buddha, Shakyamuni Buddha, Kannon, zazen, tantra, or some combination.”

Yes, yes, and yes! As you know, I live in Thailand, attend a Korean Seon temple, have a devotional practice to the Bodhisattva of Compassion, see the precepts as being of vast importance, and love Pure Land Buddhism too (my partner is Jodo-shinshu) – to choose an exclusive practice would, for me, be to deny vaste swathes of my experience and karmic connections.

Thank you so much for a wonderful and fascinating post,

All beings, one Buddha-nature,
Praise to Amida Buddha,
Praise to the Bodhisattva of Compassion!

Marcus

Apologies on the late reply:

Mark: I think the issue for me is not one of difficulty, but flexibility and inclusiveness. My experiences have been rather confining in Pure Land so far, as well as with Western Zen, so yes confining is an apt term.

Nathan Welcome to the JLR. Yes, people do like to play up their own founders as a matter of legitimacy, and due to historiography, we’ve often neglected “classic” Japanese Buddhism in favor of the newer sects simply because they’re old and replaced with more streamlined models. Having a sample of Nara Buddhism only briefly, I like what’s there, for what it’s worth.

Then again, my experience with Kamakura Buddhism is with Nichiren and Zen; neither one really eschews things like keeping the precepts or other broader Mahayana practices (although you almost certainly won’t catch a Nichiren Buddhist chanting the Nembutsu); Jodo & Shin Buddhism seem more narrowly focused on “other power.” I can see how that might seem confining.

Another thing to consider is that whenever someone, or a group of someones innovates, as was the case with Dogen, Nichiren, and Honen in 12th and 13th century Japan, there is tendency to see these innovations as better than everything previous. Not always, but pretty often. I don’t think this excuses the sometimes blatant refusal to value other paths, but it does point to the motivation to make “legitimate” the new approach. I suppose then it’s up to the following generations to decide what to do with the legacy left by the founders.